


All's Fair in Games and Deduction

by FinalSolution



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Christmas Fluff, Fluff, Gen, Sherlock Secret Santa, pre-Reichenbach (yay!)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-02
Updated: 2014-01-02
Packaged: 2018-01-07 03:10:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1114787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FinalSolution/pseuds/FinalSolution
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You said I could choose.”  John’s tone was calm, patient.  He had grown to be an expert at handling one sulking detective by this point, and he felt an imminent brood on the horizon.</p><p>It was two days before Christmas in 221B, and John had been adamant about having one day of the holiday set aside for themselves, something quiet and altogether separate from the party that would be taking place in the flat in short time.  “Just some time with my best mate,” he had said.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All's Fair in Games and Deduction

**Author's Note:**

> This is my Sherlock Secret Santa gift for [cumberlocked](http://cumberlocked.tumblr.com/). A bit late, but I noticed she was away until the new year, so I held off a bit on posting. Happy Christmas and New Year!

Sherlock set his eyes squarely on John, his face almost a caricature of itself, turned into an exaggerated frown. Fittingly, he sat with his arms crossed over his chest. He was sat on the sofa across from John, legs crossed awkwardly over one another, clad in a grey tshirt, dark pyjama bottoms and his trademark blue dressing gown.

“This is ricidulous.”

“You said I could choose.” John’s tone was calm, patient. He had grown to be an expert at handling one sulking detective by this point, and he felt an imminent brood on the horizon.

It was two days before Christmas in 221B, and John had been adamant about having one day of the holiday set aside for themselves, something quiet and altogether separate from the party that would be taking place in the flat in short time. “Just some time with my best mate,” he had said.

“You spend _all_ of your time with – Wait, I’m your best mate?”

“Don’t be a git.”

That had been the exchange, and then John had proposed an evening of board games and eggnog. He wasn’t sure why he was feeling particularly like revisiting his childhood Christmases, but a night of games with Sherlock had seemed like an innocent enough idea at the time.

It had been three hours and Sherlock had already managed to ruin the Cluedo board by ramming it into the wall with a perfectly fine butcher knife (well, as perfectly fine as could be expected – John had certainly scalded the thing enough in hot water and bleach during its lifetime), had made a mess of the Monopoly money by tossing it around in a whirlwind after shouting about embezzlement and fraud, and had had one hell of a time bragging about how much better he was at Operation than John was, what with his being a real doctor and all that (“honestly, John, you’re an embarrrassment to your profession”), so it had been John’s own idea to nix that one.

He had thought that prehaps turnabout would be fair play, and so had decided on a rousing game of Guess Who. 

“’A thrilling game of deduction,’” Sherlock sniffed, making the face now of someone who had just taken a whiff of a ruptured sewer line, and looking for all the world like he might be sick right there on the sofa. “I didn’t take it upon you to sink to so low of an insult.”

“It’s just a game.”

“It’s not deduction, it’s hit-and-miss guessing games!”

“I think that’s why they call it _Guess Who_ , Sherlock.”

Sherlock turned his head to the side and made a wave of his hand toward the game apparatus in front of him. “This is stupid. It’s a mockery and I don’t want to play.”

“You’re just upset that I’ve almost got you pinned down and you’re doing a poor job.” John couldn’t help the smile that crept onto his face. It wasn’t often he got to cherish the feeling of triumph against Sherlock Holmes, so by God, he was going to enjoy it. He cleared his throat and cast his eyes down at his game board again, going over the select few choices of game characters that he had left available.

“Alfred?”

“Bugger!” cursed the detective, consecutively throwing a hand out and flinging his board over the side of the sofa and onto the floor. “You must have cheated!” The man was almost thirty-six and still had the entitlement and temper of a six-year-old when he so chose, John mused. He thought he would have a fairly good handle on dealing with tantrums by the time he had his own children to contend with, thanks to his flatmate.

“Or you can’t bear the thought of my deduction skills being better than yours,” John chidded, the smile broken out into a full-on beam by this point.

“Not on your best day, John Watson,” Sherlock mumbled. “And not on my worst. Battleship next. Let’s see how reputable your naval strategy is.”

“Sherlock – “

“Ten to one says it isn’t very.”

No one could say that John Watson wasn’t up to a challenge when it was presented to him. It was gearing up to be a long night.


End file.
